Fratas

Fratas was impressive in winning the three-year-olds’ maiden hurdle at Fairyhouse on Tuesday. She led from early, Michael O’Sullivan got her into a really nice racing rhythm early on, and her jumping was very good for a debutante. And when the well-fancied Eagle Fang joined her at the second last flight, she found lots. She went on again on the far side over the final flight and she won nicely, with the first two finishing nicely clear of their rivals.

Michael Mulvany’s filly just continues to progress. She won four in a row on the flat between Galway in August and Navan in early October, improving from a flat rating of 67 to a rating of 88, and she is now one for one over hurdles. Of course, it is early in the season, there are many more talented juvenile hurdlers to come, but this race has been a good pointer to the future. Zarak The Brave won it last year, and he won the Galway Hurdle in August, the first four-year-old to win the Galway Hurdle in 23 years, and Jeff Kidder won this race three years ago, before going on to win the Fred Winter Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival and the Champion Four-Year-Old Hurdle at the Punchestown Festival later that season. Fratas clocked a time that was almost 11 seconds faster than the time that exciting prospect An Tobar clocked in winning the maiden hurdle, albeit off a much more sedate early pace, and she could take a high rank among the juvenile hurdlers this season.

Fairyhouse, 7^th November 2023